Sullivan, Kathryn D. (Author)
The MIT Press
Physical Details: 304
Language: English
The first American woman to walk in space recounts her experience as part of the team that launched, rescued, repaired, and maintained the Hubble Space Telescope.The Hubble Space Telescope has revolutionized our understanding of the universe. It has, among many other achievements, revealed thousands of galaxies in what seemed to be empty patches of sky; transformed our knowledge of black holes; found dwarf planets with moons orbiting other stars; and measured precisely how fast the universe is expanding. In Handprints on Hubble, retired astronaut Kathryn Sullivan describes her work on the NASA team that made all of this possible. Sullivan, the first American woman to walk in space, recounts how she and other astronauts, engineers, and scientists launched, rescued, repaired, and maintained Hubble, the most productive observatory ever built.Along the way, Sullivan chronicles her early life as a “Sputnik Baby,” her path to NASA through oceanography, and her initiation into the space program as one of “thirty-five new guys.” (She was also one of the first six women to join NASA's storied astronaut corps.) She describes in vivid detail what liftoff feels like inside a spacecraft (it's like “being in an earthquake and a fighter jet at the same time”), shows us the view from a spacewalk, and recounts the temporary grounding of the shuttle program after the Challenger disaster.Sullivan explains that “maintainability” was designed into Hubble, and she describes the work of inventing the tools and processes that made on-orbit maintenance possible. Because in-flight repair and upgrade was part of the plan, NASA was able to fix a serious defect in Hubble's mirrors―leaving literal and metaphorical “handprints on Hubble.” Handprints on Hubble was published with the support of the MIT Press Fund for Diverse Voices.
...MoreSimilar Citations
Book
Christopher Gainor;
Michele Ostovar;
(2021)
Not Yet Imagined: A Study of Hubble Space Telescope Operations
(/isis/citation/CBB744617492/)
Book
Neufeld, Michael J.;
(2013)
Spacefarers: Images of Astronauts and Cosmonauts in the Heroic Era of Spaceflight
(/isis/citation/CBB001201283/)
Book
Conway, Erik M.;
(2015)
Exploration and Engineering: The Jet Propulsion Laboratory and the Quest for Mars
(/isis/citation/CBB001422612/)
Book
DeVorkin, David H.;
Smith, Robert W.;
(2004)
The Hubble Space Telescope: Imaging the Universe
(/isis/citation/CBB000771518/)
Book
Zimmerman, Robert;
(2008)
The Universe in a Mirror: The Saga of the Hubble Telescope and the Visionaries Who Built It
(/isis/citation/CBB000831282/)
Article
Maria Almeida;
Vitor Bonifácio;
(2023)
Carlos Bettencourt Faria’s Dream: The Mulemba Astronomical Observatory at Luanda in Angola
(/isis/citation/CBB427973226/)
Article
Kane Mullen;
(2020)
Temporary Measures: Women Computers at the Royal Observatory, Greenwich, 1890–1895
(/isis/citation/CBB011712539/)
Book
Kessler, Elizabeth A.;
(2012)
Picturing the Cosmos: Hubble Space Telescope Images and the Astronomical Sublime
(/isis/citation/CBB001450996/)
Book
Hamel, Jürgen;
Keil, Inge;
(2007)
Der Meister und die Fernrohre: Das Wechselspiel zwischen Astronomie und Optik in der Geschichte
(/isis/citation/CBB000930172/)
Article
Talebian, Mohammad;
Talebian, Ehsan;
(2012)
Alenush Terian: The Iranian Solar Mother
(/isis/citation/CBB001221646/)
Book
Hearnshaw, J. B.;
Gilmore, Alan;
(2015)
Mt. John, The First 50 Years: A Celebration of Half a Century of Optical Astronomy at the University of Canterbury
(/isis/citation/CBB001551820/)
Book
McCray, W. Patrick;
(2004)
Giant Telescopes: Astronomical Ambition and the Promise of Technology
(/isis/citation/CBB000330964/)
Book
Ansari, Anousheh;
Hickam, Homer H.;
(2010)
My Dream of Stars: From Daughter of Iran to Space Pioneer
(/isis/citation/CBB001032642/)
Book
Vertesi, Janet Amelia;
(2015)
Seeing Like a Rover: How Robots, Teams, and Images Craft Knowledge of Mars
(/isis/citation/CBB001510006/)
Book
Leverington, David;
(2000)
New Cosmic Horizons: Space Astronomy from the V2 to the Hubble Space Telescope
(/isis/citation/CBB000101887/)
Book
Pierre Léna;
(2020)
Astronomy’s Quest for Sharp Images: From Blurred Pictures to the Very Large Telescope
(/isis/citation/CBB331621161/)
Article
Zijlstra, Albert A.;
Davis, Richard J.;
(2012)
Sir Bernard Lovell (1913--2012)
(/isis/citation/CBB001320464/)
Book
Farquhar, Robert W.;
(2011)
Fifty Years on the Space Frontier: Halo Orbits, Comets, Asteroids, and More
(/isis/citation/CBB001252441/)
Book
Albert Glinsky;
(2022)
Switched On: Bob Moog and the Synthesizer Revolution
(/isis/citation/CBB124652666/)
Book
Katia Moskvitch;
(2020)
Neutron Stars: The Quest to Understand the Zombies of the Cosmos
(/isis/citation/CBB559459540/)
Be the first to comment!